Ann-Marie MacDonald - Way the Crow Flies

“Speak up.”

“Pardon?”

“I said, what is your name, little girl?”

Madeleine looks up at the judge. He has a big frog face.

“Madeleine McCarthy.”

“These gentlemen want to hear you—” Off to one side, on chairs ranged like bleachers, a bunch of old men sit facing her. They already look disappointed.

“The jury needs to hear you,” says the judge. “What is your name?”

“MADELEINE McCARTHY!”

He looks startled. Titters from the audience. Madeleine looks out; smiling faces. Where is Dad? Where is her mother?

“Well, Madeleine, how old are you?”

“NINE!” Laughter.

“Order, please.”

She is not trying to be funny, only obedient. But the judge doesn’t sound mad. “You don’t need to speak quite so loudly, Madeleine.”

“Sorry.”

“That’s all right. Do you know what it means to take an oath?”

“Yes.”

“What does it mean?”

Ricky Froelich is sitting at a table in front. He is taller. Bony. He is looking at her, but it doesn’t seem as though he is looking at anyone he knows. She smiles at him.

“I don’t think I will swear this child,” says the judge.

Madeleine looks up again — what was the question? She is in trouble now. A tortoise in the court of King Arthur.

“My lord, that is entirely up to your discretion,” says Mr. Waller — he is Ricky’s lawyer. He has bags under his eyes but his black gown shimmers and floats when he moves. “Though I would like the child to be sworn if possible.”

“I know you would like it, Mr. Waller, but that is not why we are here. What grade are you in, Madeleine?”

“I’m going into grade five, your honour.” Not too loud, not too soft, look at the judge, pay attention or you will not get to swear.

“My lord,” says the judge to her.

“Pardon?”

“In Canada a judge is addressed as ‘my lord,’ or ‘sir.’”

“My lord,” trying not to do an English accent— don’t be smart .

“We have television to thank,” he says, and people titter again.

There’s Dad. Sitting next to Maman, a few rows behind Mr. Froelich and Colleen. He winks at her. She smiles back as discreetly as she can, and feels like a puppet.

“What does it mean to take an oath, Madeleine?”

“It means you swear to tell the truth.”

“To tell the truth,” he says. “And what is that?”

Is this a trick question? Is he talking about the TV show To Tell the Truth? Will the real Madeleine McCarthy please stand up? What does he mean?

“What is To Tell the Truth?” she repeats.

“Do you know the difference between a lie and the truth?”

“Yes your ma — my lord.” Your majesty?!

“What is the difference?”

“The truth is when you say what happened when someone asks you, and you don’t leave anything out just to try and make them believe something else, and you don’t act like they’re only asking you only one exact thing, you have to tell everything and that’s what ‘the whole truth’ means.” She takes a breath. She feels clearer, as though she has just woken up.

The judge nods. “I wish more adults had a similar grasp. What grade are you in, Madeleine — rather, who is your teacher?”

“My teacher last year was Mr. March.”

“Did you like him?”

“No,” she says, and everyone laughs.

“Order please, ladies and gentlemen, I would ask you to remember why you are here.” He looks back at her. “You are being truthful, Madeleine, that’s good.”

Halfway toward the back, Jack smiles and feels his face relax back into flesh. It had tightened across his bones like a burn; he was shocked, like everyone else in this room, by what a little girl said this morning under oath.

“You live in the Permanent Married Quarters with your family?”

“Yes sir,” replies Madeleine.

“Do you go to Sunday school?”

“We call it catechism.”

“What church do you go to?”

“We’re Catholic.”

“Roman Catholic, I see. I think this girl might understand.”

Who is he talking to?

Jack licks the corner of his mouth. A young child, no older than his daughter — a friend of hers if he is not mistaken, pretty little thing; Marjorie. Where did she get her dreadful story? He watched the jury turn to stone as the child testified. But if Madeleine is sworn, her testimony will count. All Rick needs is reasonable doubt. And Madeleine will provide that. She will corroborate what Elizabeth Froelich so painfully tried to communicate to the jury this morning. Karen was there to translate. The Crown turned this to his advantage, claiming the mother was putting words in her daughter’s mouth, since she was the only one who could understand what the poor girl was saying. It ended with Elizabeth in tears, her testimony struck and Mr. Waller — and, by extension, Karen Froelich — chastised by the judge for subjecting a “poor crippled child” to such an ordeal.

The judge turns to Madeleine again. “Do you know you are under obligation here to tell the truth?”

“Yes, my lord,” says Madeleine.

“Do you understand that?”

“Yes.”

“What is that brooch you are wearing?”

“It’s a lighthouse.”

“Where is it from?”

“It’s from Acadia”—this poor brooch was touched by Mr. March—“my mother is Acadian.” Mr. March never would have touched it if I weren’t ashamed to speak French. “We speak French,” she says.

“I think we should swear this little girl.”

I passed .

Jack wipes a trickle of sweat from his temple. It’s almost over. He longs to undo the top button of his shirt but he doesn’t wish to worry Mimi, sitting next to him; he’s been a little short of breath lately. The little girl, Marjorie, was convincing. And the statement taken from the absent one, Grace…. Jack shivers. Innocent children. How could they know of such things?

“Bailiff?” says the judge.

A pot-bellied man in a uniform approaches Madeleine. He looks like Mr. Plodd, the policeman in Noddy . He has handcuffs on his belt and carries a big book in his hands.

Jack stares at the back of Froelich’s head, then Rick’s. Froelich is a good man, but naive. Where is the boy from? Where was he before the age of twelve? In some institution. Terrible things may have happened to him there. Children learn what they live. Jack knows Rick is innocent of the murder charge, but is it possible that what those little girls said is true? Has he interfered with children? With Madeleine?

“Place your right hand on the Bible.”

Jack watches as his daughter is sworn. If anyone has touched her…. He feels — almost hears — something bend, like a twig, in his left temple. He blinks. He sees his daughter suppressing a grin as she listens to the bailiff — he can tell she is trying not to laugh. She’s fine. This experience will roll right off her back. He would know if anyone had touched her — Mimi would know…. But something must have happened to those other two little girls. Where were their parents? Jack glanced at Squadron Leader Nolan’s face while his daughter gave her testimony. Where was he? If Ricky Froelich molested those children, he deserves to be up there. With that thought, something releases at the base of Jack’s skull. His headache — the low-grade one he has ceased to notice — unlocks and begins mercifully to seep away, like runoff down a grate.

“… so help you God?”

Madeleine says, “I do.” You may now kiss the bailiff . She looks out, expecting Dad to be beaming, but he is just watching her steadily. So is Colleen. And Mr. Froelich.

She is ready. To Tell the Truth , with Kitty Carlisle and your host….